In response to the “desperate bid” by
Federated Farmers to curtail Greenpeace, the
environmental heavyweight has issued a correction to the
agri-industry lobby group’s “scurrilous complaint” made to
the Charities Commission yesterday.
Greenpeace
Aotearoa spokesperson Niamh O’Flynn says, “It’s just
another attempt to shut down dissent by Federated Farmers.
The Feds are a lobby group for New Zealand’s biggest
polluters, and this crack at peaceful protest is part of a
global trend that we must not stand for.
Greenpeace
has faced polluters trying to shut us down for decades. Just
like the French bombed the Rainbow Warrior 40 years ago to
try to stop our opposition to nuclear testing in the
Pacific, and the oil industry is currently trying to
eliminate Greenpeace in the US, this is another, albeit
impotent, attempt to curtail legitimate peaceful
protest.”
Greenpeace says that the Federated Farmers
list of Greenpeace protests is far from comprehensive and
omits dozens of examples of direct action that have played a
key role in bringing about positive change in Aotearoa and
beyond.
O’Flynn says, “Greenpeace has a long history
of taking direct action to highlight environmental
injustices and stop polluting industries like Fonterra from
harming the environment. Federated Farmers have curated a
list of some of our most impactful actions – but they’ve
left quite a few out and we want to set the record
straight.”
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“Since the 1970s, Greenpeace
has campaigned in Aotearoa and the Pacific to ensure that
the environment is protected from harm by industries like
nuclear weapons, fossil fuels, intensive dairy and
commercial fishing that cause significant harm to our
collective home. That means that sometimes we will put our
bodies on the line to stop corporations from harming the
planet.”
“Importantly, many of our
actions to highlight environmental injustice have led to
changes that we pride ourselves on as a nation. The nuclear
free campaigns of the 1970s and 80s led to New Zealand
declaring itself nuclear free, and to the end of nuclear
testing in the Pacific. The GE-free campaign led to New
Zealand imposing a moratorium on GE crops. The campaign to
end oil and gas exploration led to a ban on new offshore oil
and gas exploration in Aotearoa. The campaign to stop the
Ruataniwha Dam protected the rivers of the Hawke’s Bay
from pollution from intensive dairy expansion, and prevented
conservation land from being flooded to build a
dam.
“New Zealanders care deeply about nature and
history shows that Greenpeace protests have protected that..
Our actions sit alongside long-fought legal battles,
petitions, and mass protests and marches in the streets of
New Zealand’s biggest cities.
“We wanted to take
this opportunity to reflect on our long history of actions
that have succeeded in protecting nature from industries
that seek to destroy it.”
An expanded (but not
comprehensive), list of key Greenpeace Aotearoa actions
dating back to the 1970s is
below.
1970s:
- In 1972, the Nuclear Campaign
started with the first protest flotilla mobilisation to
oppose and disrupt the French Government’s atmospheric
nuclear weapons testing programme at Moruroa Atoll in Te Ao
Maohi/French Polynesia. This was led by the boat (SV)
Greenpeace III, previously named the Vega. - In 1973,
a second, larger flotilla sailed to the Moruroa Atoll
including the Vega. Sailing into the nuclear testing zone
prevented the French from being able to detonate
bombs.
1980s:
- In July 1985, the
Greenpeace boat Rainbow Warrior was bombed in the Auckland
Harbour following direct actions in the Pacific to oppose
nuclear testing – including the evacuation of the people of
Rongelap. - In September 1985, Greenpeace sent MV
Greenpeace to protest against the French Government’s
nuclear testing programme at Moruroa Atoll alongside a
flotilla of New Zealand protest boats including SV Vega, SV
Alliance, SV Varangian, and SV
Breeze.
1990s:
- In 1995 Greenpeace
once again sailed the Rainbow Warrior II into nuclear
testing zones in Moruroa and Tahiti to protest the
resumption of French nuclear testing. - In 1995,
Greenpeace protested against CHOGM in Auckland over the
impending execution of Ogoni environmental activist Ken
Saro-Wiwa by the military regime that ruled
Nigeria. - In 1997, Greenpeace activists blocked the
Stratford gas-fired power station’s generators being
unloaded in the Port of Taranaki - In 1998, during the
SV Rainbow Warrior II tour, Greenpeace ‘unplugged’
Fletcher Challenge Energy’s seismic testing cabling in
Taranaki. - During the 1990s, Greenpeace championed
the creation of a 50 million square kilometre Southern Ocean
Whale Sanctuary around the Antarctic continent and launched
a series of anti-whaling expeditions into the Southern Ocean
to expose and confront the Japanese Government’s bogus
‘scientific’ whaling fleet operating
there.
2000s:
- In December 2000,
Greenpeace activists stopped the production of genetically
engineered feed at a Tegel plant in Takanini. - In
2002, activists in Auckland scaled a waste incineration
facility chimney, capped it, and locked on to highlight
dioxin pollution. - In August 2003, Greenpeace
activists boarded a coal ship in Tauranga in opposition to
coal mining. - In 2004, the SV Rainbow Warrior II‘s
crew used inflatable boats to disrupt the NZ bottom trawler,
Ocean Reward, to stop it destroying deep-sea life while
fishing in international waters in the Tasman Sea. They
delayed the fishing vessel from deploying its trawl net by
attaching an inflatable life-raft to it, running the
gauntlet of being shot at with compressed air guns and
sprayed with high pressure fire hoses by the Ocean
Reward’s crew. - In May 2004, Greenpeace activists
locked on to the Auckland McDonalds distribution centre
gates over McDonalds’ use of GE feed. - In February
2005, Greenpeace activists occupied the roof of the Marsden
B power station. - In July 2006, Greenpeace activists
locked on to a Chinese bottom trawling ship in the Port of
Nelson to prevent the destruction caused by the bottom
trawling industry to the seafloor. - In October 2008,
Greenpeace activists in Tokoroa locked on to logging
equipment to stop conversion to pasture for intensive
agriculture. - In October 2009, Greenpeace activists
locked on to a palm kernel shipment in Taranaki to protest
links to rainforest destruction and climate
change. - In November 2009, Greenpeace activists shut
down a pit of a New Vale lignite coal mine, used by Fonterra
to help fuel operations at its nearby Edendale dairy
factory.
2010s
- In May 2010,
Greenpeace activists locked on to a Fonterra coal power
plant in Clandeboye - In February 2011, Greenpeace
activists locked on to a ship carrying palm kernel in New
Plymouth to protest the links to rainforest destruction and
climate change. - Also in 2011, a flotilla of boats
from around the North Island, including the Te Whanau a
Apanui fishing vessel San Pietro, began a landmark at-sea
protest against offshore oil surveying by oil giant
Petrobras that lasted 42 days. - In 2012, Greenpeace
activists occupied the oil drilling ship The Noble
Discoverer in Port Taranaki and camped on its tower for 77
hours, to protest the environmental destruction caused by
oil drilling. - In 2013, as part of the Oil Free Seas
Flotilla, Greenpeace activists broke the newly introduced
Anadarko Amendment by sailing into the exclusion zone to
confront oil giant Anadarko at sea. - In September
2016, Greenpeace ‘returned to sender’ the site office at
the Ruataniwha Dam construction site. The activists removed
the site office from its location near the Makaroro River,
and returned it to the regional council who were promoting
the dam’s construction. After a long campaign to prevent
this dam from being built, the Council pulled its funding
for the dam and the land exchange required to construct it
was declared unlawful by the Supreme Court. - In 2016,
Greenpeace and people from around the country blockaded Sky
City which was hosting the annual oil industry
conference. - In 2016 Greenpeace activists locked on
board the NIWA taxpayer-funded climate and ocean research
boat which had been chartered by petroleum giant Chevron to
survey for oil in New Zealand waters - In August 2017,
Greenpeace protestors spent 12 hours locked inside
irrigation pipes in a bid to slow the construction of the
Central Plains Water Scheme - In September 2017,
Greenpeace activists staged a ‘lightning’ occupation of
a dam construction site in Canterbury after facing legal
threats from a big irrigation company. - The Amazon
Warrior Sea Protest in 2017, where Greenpeace’s Executive
Director Russel Norman and two others jumped into the ocean
in front of the Amazon Warrior to prevent seismic
drilling. - In July 2018, Greenpeace protestors
occupied the site of a proposed dairy expansion in Mackenzie
Country and refused to leave. - The occupation of oil
drilling support vessel the Skandi Atlantic at the port of
Timaru in 2019, to prevent it from supporting oil giant OMV
to search for oil off the coast of Taranaki - In 2019,
Greenpeace activists alongside youth climate movement School
Strike 4 Climate occupied the headquarters of OMV in
Taranaki for several days over the role of the fossil fuel
industry in fuelling the climate
crisis.
2020s:
- In 2020, Greenpeace
activists climbed the Fertiliser Association building and
unfurled a giant banner calling for an end to the use of
synthetic nitrogen fertiliser. Subsequently, the government
introduced a cap on the amount of synthetic nitrogen
fertiliser used on farms. - In 2021, Greenpeace
activists took action against fishing company Talleys in
Nelson, painting a message on the side of the ship to
protest bottom trawling. - In 2022, Greenpeace
activists deployed a 1500 square metre banner at the Kapuni
Fertiliser factory, labelling synthetic nitrogen fertiliser
‘cancer fertiliser’. - In 2023, Greenpeace
activists dropped banners inside the Parliament gallery to
protest inaction on climate change. - In 2024,
Greenpeace activists scaled Fonterra’s Te Rapa dairy factory
in Hamilton and dropped a giant banner reading
‘Fonterra’s methane cooks the climate’, to protest the
superheating methane gas produced by Fonterra’s oversized
dairy herd. - Also in 2024, Greenpeace shut down the
offices of Straterra – a mining lobbying firm who are
working to advance seabed mining off the coast of Taranaki
despite widespread community opposition. Two Greenpeace
activists scaled the building while three others locked
themselves inside the offices. - In November 2024,
Greenpeace activists interrupted the AGM of Manuka Resources
– the parent company of seabed mining company Trans-Tasman
Resources who are attempting to mine the seabed off the
coast of Taranaki. - In April 2025, Greenpeace
activists shut down operations at a palm kernel storage
facility in Port Taranaki for several hours, preventing a
ship from offloading thirty thousand tonnes of palm kernel
connected to the destruction of Indonesian
rainforests.
